


The Death of the Sun

by Jackie Thomas (Jackie_Thomas)



Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: 1952, Alternate Universe - 1950s, Great smog of London, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-07
Packaged: 2020-02-16 18:37:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18697039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jackie_Thomas/pseuds/Jackie%20Thomas
Summary: A thick fog settles over London.





	1. Friday 5 December 1952

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place during the Great Smog of London which began one Friday in December 1952. There is some spoiler-free historical background in the end notes.

 

It is eight thirty and the sun should have risen by now.  We should have a bruise blue sky and smoking chimneys at Battersea.  But all I can see through the window of the bus is my own shadowed reflection. 

It is a short walk from Piccadilly Circus to the nick at Savile Row.  All my landmarks are curtained in grey.  Even Eros has vanished and we are a ship without a figurehead.  It is freezing but the air is still, there is no breeze at all. 

I took a promotion to Chief Inspector when I came to the city in ‘51 and was given responsibility for those murders that do not fall to Scotland Yard.  I don’t get a look at cases with an organised crime or vice link either.  My colleagues like to keep this profitable line for themselves.  I have never fitted up a suspect, planted evidence or taken a backhander despite plenty of offers, so I have no objection on those grounds. 

Having quickly got the measure of the place and also of my predecessor who was a drinking man, I approached the backlog of work with trepidation.  But I had been pleasantly surprised when I reviewed the cabinet of open cases.  I discovered that a diligent hand had been at work, proceeding with enquiries much as I would have.  I tracked this hand to the office across from mine, to Detective Sergeant James Hathaway and immediately claimed him for my bagman. 

I can see him now standing at his window, as fair as a boy, cigarette in hand, dressed like the Duke of Windsor.  If I am a fish out of water here, he is on the fishmonger’s slab.  Suspected of having an education and a mind of his own, it is only his war record, which involved parachuting behind enemy lines, that allows him a relatively quiet life. 

His telephone rings and, after a brief conversation, he takes his coat and hat from the hook and comes into my office. 

“Good morning, sir.” 

“Good morning yourself.  Something in?” 

“A body at a Westminster public convenience.” 

“Gents or ladies?” 

“Gents, as is the body.” 

“Get a car and I’ll meet you outside.” 

“The fog’s slowing the traffic down, if you wanted to leave this one to me.” 

He is still adapting to the novelty of an inspector attending a murder.  I am certain he sees me as surplus to requirements. 

“Just make sure we’ve got torches.” 

By now the traffic is creeping along.  We are obliged to drive slowly, headlights on, peering over the steering wheel to stand a chance of avoiding oblivious pedestrians and dithering drivers.  Our constables are already on the street at major intersections holding brightly lit flares.  The ‘soups’, as they call them, come frequently enough that a procedure is well established to keep traffic moving. 

*** 

The public lavatory is in a quiet street not far from the Houses of Parliament.  We find a constable guarding the scene and two others waiting for us inside. 

The victim is a man in his thirties wearing an inexpensive suit.  Brown haired and pale skinned, there is a hungry look about him.  He has a head wound and finger marks on his neck.  There are smears of blood on the tiled wall and more in a puddle on the floor where he fell.  

“Someone bashed his head against the wall, then strangled him,” Hathaway says, lighting a cigarette.  “A bit excessive.” 

“It’s thorough.  They made sure he was dead.  Could it be a sexual encounter gone wrong?” 

“This convenience isn’t known for that kind of activity.”  

Although this might simply mean it is a safer bet for more cautious cottagers. 

The body was discovered by a man who came in to use the facilities.  He was too late to witness anything and, unsurprisingly given the conditions outside, no other witnesses have come forward.  

The police surgeon arrives soon after we do.  He is wearing a gauze mask over his nose and mouth and takes it off to admonish the rest of us for not doing the same. 

“Can’t you smell the pollution you’re breathing in?” 

He examines the victim and agrees with Hathaway’s assessment of what happened.  He also tells us the man is newly dead; he was murdered less than two hours ago. 

“Does he have a name?” I ask. 

The victim’s wallet contains no identification other than a membership card for a Soho jazz club.  This identifies him as John Morley. 

We do not attempt to take fingerprints as the lavatory is a rather grubby public place and once the surgeon has finished his work, we authorise the body’s removal to the mortuary. 

I hand the membership card to Hathaway, “Shall we see what they know about Mr Morley at the Tunisia Club?” 

The club, in Old Compton Street, is not yet open but the manageress is there working on her books among the coloured lanterns and Ali Baba baskets.  In common with most other clubs in the city, the Tunisia has a membership system in operation to bypass the licensing laws and stay open late.  She checks her files and shows us the form Morley completed to apply for membership.  It gives us a middle name, a home address in Vauxhall and a date of birth.  There is no next of kin listed but it is enough to be going on with. 

Our next stop should be Vauxhall but when we come out of the club, we find ourselves in the depths of the peasouper.  It is now impossible to see more than a few yards ahead but this is not fog anymore.  It is a gritty yellow and black mess with a hellish stink that hits you in the throat and lungs.  

“A true _London Particular_ ,” Hathaway says covering his mouth with his handkerchief.  “That happened really fast.” 

We are deliberating over our next move when a car swerves off the road and comes to a sudden stop on the pavement.  We hardly see it until it is upon us and we both have to scramble out of its way.  We are lucky, but the poor fellow driving is dazed and bleeding from hitting his head. 

The manageress takes the man in while Hathaway radios for an ambulance.  He tells me he drives down Old Compton Street every working day of his life but lost his bearings and then his sense of where the road ended and the pavement began.  The coppers on traffic duty must be having an interesting day. 

The incident and its small shock have brought back memories of my wife’s death.  It had also happened when a car mounted the pavement not far from here. I hadn’t been there to witness it but I have often been tormented by my imagination.  I go outside to where Hathaway is waiting.  The street lights have come on, creating halos of light and he stands beneath one, his collar turned up, his hands keeping warm in the pockets of his coat. 

“What a miserable bloody day,” I say. 

He reads me with a glance, “It’ll pass, sir.” 

We abandon the idea of following up Morley’s home address until the soup clears, hopefully in a few hours, but decide we must take the car back to the station as it is likely to be needed for emergency calls.  We accomplish the five-minute journey in an hour by Hathaway walking ahead with a torch while I drive at a walking pace or wait interminably for the road to clear.  Bus conductors are already doing the same with their vehicles but many other drivers have simply left their cars parked by the side of the road and continued on foot. 

It is a busy day, but mainly for those with responsibility for the traffic and all associated bangs and crashes.  With the exception of our Mr Morley, crime goes into a lull.  We suppose no criminal wants to be caught in a traffic jam while making a getaway or lose their way home.  We deal with the occasional confrontation in chaotic bus and underground queues but most of these people lived through the Blitz or another front in the war.  They are used to hardship and inconvenience and take pride in not making a fuss. 

There are always exceptions.  That afternoon a furious custody sergeant arrives in my office. 

“DS Hathaway is letting all the prisoners go!” 

“I wasn’t aware we had made any arrests,” I say.  “That makes a change.” 

“The fairies, sir.  From last night.  He’s letting the flaming fairies go.” 

Although it is too much trouble to catch people who burgle houses or take handbags from old ladies, this nick does a roaring trade in arresting men who frequent certain public lavatories and parks for sex.  It is an offence Churchill’s new Home Secretary is obsessed with, which means the Met is too. 

It is the habit of West End Central coppers to target common cottaging spots, even acting disgracefully as _agent provocateur_.  Laws aren’t made by the police, of course, we have a simple duty to enforce them.  But where the consequences to the individual following arrest far outweigh any harm they might have caused, I believe we have a duty to proceed cautiously.  Admittedly, I am biased. 

The wretched man bends my ear all the way downstairs. 

“He went to Cambridge, Chief Inspector Lewis,” he whispers.  “Like Maclean and Burgess.  I reckon he’s one of them.” 

“Are you accusing him of being a university graduate?  Because I believe the war put paid to all that.” 

“You know what I mean.” 

I stop, making him stop.  “You’re suggesting he’s a Soviet agent and a homosexual.  These are serious allegations.  Perhaps you’d like to address them to the commander.  I assume you have evidence.” 

He backs off swiftly enough, “All I’m saying is, he’s got no business freeing our prisoners.” 

We find Hathaway overseeing the return of personal effects to a group of men who were last night’s haul from various hot spots.  They had not been charged due to the demands today’s weather placed on manpower.  They all look ill and one is coughing violently.  

“What’s going on, sergeant?” I ask him quietly. 

“The cells aren’t safe, sir.  Excuse me, I’ll be back in a moment.” 

He escorts the men, a motley mix of ages and social classes, upstairs and, no doubt, out of the building.  

I go into the nearest cell.  At first, I think someone has started a fire in there but then I realise it is the soup.  The smog has seeped in, presumably through the ventilation grid.  The air is sulphurous and there are clouds of it floating about the room.  I’m coughing after only a few seconds.  I find all the other cells in the same state. 

By the time I have finished my inspection, Hathaway has returned and the custody sergeant has located his chief; an idiot of the first order.  I turn to Hathaway who appears to be feeding arrest records into the brazier. 

“Wait for me in my office, sergeant,” I say. 

He pushes the rest of the paper into the flames and goes upstairs. 

“What’s going on, Lewis?” The Chief Inspector says.  “Hathaway’s got no authority to interfere with what goes on down here.” 

“I’m sorry, but you can’t keep detainees in these conditions.  If one of them had a bad heart or chest you would have had a corpse on your hands.” 

“Now you listen,” he says.  “CID don’t get a say down here.  And one dead poof is frankly no great loss.” 

It is a common enough perspective. 

“Your man needs to look to the welfare of all prisoners.  That’s his job and it’s the law.” 

“I’ll make sure champagne’s on ice for them next time, shall I?” 

I might as well talk to the smog. “Let’s leave it at that,” I say and go back upstairs. 

Hathaway, blood up, has been pacing my office. 

“They would have left them to choke to death,” he spits.  “They would have treated a cage of rats better.” 

I close the office door, “Be more careful, can’t you.  You should have called me to sort it out.” 

“It doesn’t matter how careful we are, Robbie.  They’ll still kill us one by one.  These damned people.” 

He fumbles for a cigarette and I take his lighter from him.  I light his cigarette and he dips down and presses a swift, defiant kiss to my lips.  I kiss him slowly back.

 

 

 


	2. Saturday 6 December 1952

 

We eat in the canteen and then cross the road to the Burlington for a pint.  As usual, half the nick is there so Hathaway and I avoid drinking together.  The place is equally inhabited by Savile Row tailors and, while I spend the evening with a couple of other inspectors stranded by train cancellations, he ends up deep in conversation with two Italian pattern cutters.  I’d be jealous if I didn’t know the talk was of lapels, vents and ticket pockets. 

I decide against attempting the journey home and sleep the night on one of the bunks in the crowded nightshift room.  In the morning I manage a wash and shave.  A layer of grit has settled on my skin and turned my white shirt grey. 

“Did I do a shift down the pit?” The man at the next sink asks, looking in disgust at marks on his towel. 

I had been counting on waking to a clear day but there is still nothing but gloomy shapes through my office window.  Hathaway, who spent the night nodding at his desk, appears at my door. 

“Good morning, sir,” he says. 

“Look at it.” 

“It’s definitely worse.  There must be an anticyclone causing an inversion.” 

I raise an eyebrow, “Go on then, let’s hear it.” 

“An anticyclone pushes air downwards and warms it.  The air close to the ground is cooler than the air higher up and gets trapped.  All the chimney smoke and exhaust fumes get trapped with it.” 

“So the more people light their fires, the more we all choke?” 

“There’s the smoke from the factories as well.  That pollution hasn’t got anywhere to go either.” 

“Did you come here to depress me?” 

“Not primarily.  I was going to go to Giorgio’s for breakfast if you’re interested.” 

“Good idea, but I’m not having eggs.  I’ve had enough of that stink.” 

“Do you want to know why it smells like that?” 

“No.” 

“It’s because they export all the good coal.  We get the dirty stuff; second-rate and full of sulphur.  We’re breathing that in too.” 

I had been accustomed to thinking of the peasoupers as natural occurrences like snow in winter and storms in summer, just part of life in this city.  It should have been obvious; this is something we make ourselves. 

Outside is foul, freezing and dark.  My throat is sore and I would give a lot for a lungful of fresh air and a glimpse of sky.  It is quiet too.  The type of quiet you get in the dead of night or after a snowfall. 

“It’s the death of the sun,” Hathaway says into the silence. 

“Was the sun murdered? Because Scotland Yard are going to want the case.” 

“Dickens,” he tells me.  “About Smog.  S _oft black drizzle, with flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown snow-flakes — gone into mourning, one might imagine, for the death of the sun_.” 

“I wish you’d make room for some cheery thoughts in that brain of yours.” 

“I’m having a cheery thought now.” 

He takes my hand. 

It is a shock; it is too dangerous to touch in a public place and we never do. 

“It’s all right,” he says.  “No one can see.” 

He leads me to a patch of boarded up bomb site on a minor street of houses and closed businesses.  It is too risky to go to his flat or my lodgings so we have had occasion to come to this ruined house before.  The living room with its three remaining intact walls, with its torn and fading wallpaper of birds in flight provides perfect privacy.  

The birds are not there today, all are flown, but against the wall, I kiss him; my sweet summer breeze, my radiant boy.  We warm each other’s hands with our breath before my hands find his fly buttons and then his find mine. 

He straightens my hat which has gone askew, and I brush dust from his coat.  Then he lights a cigarette and we make our way to the café. 

“John Morley has a police file from the war,” he tells me over breakfast and coffee.  “He has cautions and one conviction for robbing houses during air raids while the owners were in the shelters.  He served three months.  The last arrest was in ‘44.” 

“Anything else?” 

“I found his mother’s address,” Hathaway says.  “She’s near the Old Kent Road.” 

“Good work.  Let’s get over there and see her this morning.” 

Informing next of kin is not something we can delay until the weather improves so we take a car out. 

The roads are better today.  Travelling is easier on a Saturday anyway, but there are fewer cars out than usual and no coaches.  Most bus garages are closed too and only the underground is running near normally.  It makes driving less perilous but it is still hard going in the ever-decreasing visibility. 

We get as far as we can on main roads and then walk the rest of the way by torchlight.  We see few people but we hear the footsteps of invisible passers-by or an occasional shout of ‘what street is this?’.  Hathaway seems to have no trouble navigating this alien world and we make our way without difficulty. 

We find Eileen Morley home.  She takes the news of her son’s death stoically and does not seem especially surprised to hear it.  She says she has not seen him in several months and claims not to know what he did for a living or who he spent his time with. 

She has another, older son who lives nearby.  When he is fetched by a neighbour, he gives us the names of some of John’s friends.  He also takes Hathaway aside to tell him something he would rather his mother not hear.  Hathaway relays their conversation as we walk back to the car. 

“He told me he didn’t know how his brother earned his living but assumed he was involved in criminal activity because he was so secretive about it.  They both followed jazz and would occasionally go to a show together.  In the summer, they were at the Tunisia when a man approached John.  The man was drunk and shouting; calling him an evil bastard who would ‘never get another penny out of him’.” 

“How did John answer to that?” 

“He said that the man owed him money and didn’t want to pay.” 

“Did he believe him?” 

I can just see Hathaway’s shrug, “He learnt not to believe his brother a long time ago.  He told me about it because the man seemed so full of hatred, he might have murdered him.” 

“I don’t suppose he could give a description.” 

“He thought the man looked like a ‘pansy’,” Hathaway says bitterly. 

“Which brings us back to assignations in public lavatories.  But at least we now know Morley might have had enemies and this was unlikely to have been a random attack.” 

Hathaway’s earlier buoyant mood seems to have evaporated and we make our way back to the car in silence. 

Late afternoon, I see him go out.  He does not tell me where he is off to so I assume he is on some personal errand.  When he doesn’t return, I get curious.  Something in his conversation with Morley’s brother bothered him and he has been quiet ever since. 

He has not left an address with the front desk as he is supposed to, but he has taken a car out.  

He told me he would be working on tracing some of our victim’s associates and when I look in his office, there are notes in the case file detailing his progress.  Leafing through, however, I find a more likely prospect; Morley’s home address. 

I take a car out too and drive to Vauxhall, parking on the main road.  I tie on a face mask the desk sergeant gave me, and continue on foot through the grey-green murk. 

I haven’t been this lost since the first day of the Somme when I parted company with my platoon in no man’s land.  And at least in France, there weren’t any walls to walk in to.  I’ll not admit it to anyone, but it is as frightening as it is ridiculous.  Finally, sick and gasping for breath, I find the street I need. 

Morley lived in a tall house of bedsits and one of the other lodgers directs me to his room on the first floor.  The door is unlocked and Hathaway is there, sitting in front of the fireplace where a coal fire burns.  He gives up the armchair for me and it takes a few minutes before I can stop coughing and breathe normally.  

Hathaway hands me a drink, “There’s only gin.” 

When I have recovered enough to notice my surroundings, I see the room is in disarray.  It has been thoroughly searched.  Drawers and cupboards opened, the mattress upturned, and two loose floorboards pulled up.  There are scraps of half-burnt paper in the fireplace. 

“Care to explain yourself, Hathaway?” 

He is standing, arms folded, staring down into the fire, “John Morley was a blackmailer.  When his brother described the confrontation in the Tunisia, I suspected.  I came here to find evidence.” 

“Did you find it?” 

“He had letters and photographs relating to dozens of people.  Mostly homosexuals but also women who have committed adultery or had illegal abortions.” 

“And you didn’t tell me you were coming here because –?” 

“I didn’t want to implicate you.” 

I watch as a scrap of photograph is consumed by the fire, “You’ve been destroying evidence.” 

“I’ve made sure the people he was blackmailing can’t be exposed now he’s dead.” 

“For Christ’s sake, Hathaway.  You weren’t going to tell me?” 

“No.” 

“You were going to lie to me?” 

He doesn’t answer. 

“I know we’re at West End Central, but this is interfering with a criminal investigation.” 

“I don’t honestly care,” he says, back on firmer ground.  “You know as well as I do that if the victims come to the attention of our colleagues, they’ll be prosecuted themselves.  Or if they aren’t prosecuted, their names will be made public and their lives destroyed.  I’m sick of it, sir.  I’m not going to let it happen this time.” 

“But you’ve probably destroyed evidence of his killer.  Or do you think he deserved to die?” 

“He deserved to die.” 

“Hathaway, man.” 

“But,” he concedes.  “That doesn’t justify murder.” 

He takes a black book from his pocket and hands it to me.  It is a 1952 diary.  I flick through and see that initials have been pencilled in against dates throughout and then a sum of money added beside most entries. 

“He recorded appointments with his victims.  The only appointment yesterday was RM/WM.  I’m assuming WM is Westminster.  If you look back, it was a regular monthly meeting.  He got nearly a thousand pounds out of RM this year.” 

“Do you know who he or she is?” 

Hathaway hands me a clip from The Times, “All he had was this.” 

The article is a month old and is an announcement of an engagement; Mr Richard Marsten, MP and Miss Diana Cope.  It includes a small portrait shot of the couple. 

“Our only suspect is a member of parliament?  Bloody hell.  Bet he’s a Tory too.” 

“Yes, sir.  True blue.” 

“You’re sure this is the right man?” 

“He’s the only RM in Morley’s collection.  There was a notebook with addresses associated with the initials so we can check.  I’ve burnt that but RM had an address in Eaton Place in Belgravia.” 

“You burnt that, too, did you?  Perfect.  What did Morley have on Marsten?” 

“Nothing, as far as I can see. Maybe physical evidence isn’t necessary if you’re a public figure; just the threat of an allegation is enough.  Or maybe he’s got another hiding place for his most valuable material.” 

“Well, Marsten’s not had the chance to be an adulterer, he hasn’t procured an abortion so can we assume -.” 

“We can, sir.” 

“You sound very sure.” 

“I am.  I used to know Marsten when I first came to London after the war.” 

“How did you know him?” 

“We had friends in common and moved in the same circles.  He was well known to prefer men; he never used to make a secret of it.” 

“And now he’s engaged to be married and a member of parliament.  He must have a queue of blackmailers at his door.” 

“There’s family money.  He’d make a good target.” 

I consider the implications, “We can’t go barging in on an MP; we’ll have to get permission to interview and a warrant.”  I look at my watch.  “It’s after six.  We won’t get anything more done now, so I suggest we call it a day.”  Hathaway has become quiet and still, “What?” 

He drops suddenly; crouching down beside my chair. 

“James?” 

“We have to stop,” he whispers. 

“Stop what?” 

“Us.” 

“No, James.  Why?  I don’t care if something happened between you and Marsten.  You’re entitled to your past.” 

“There was no one before you, Robbie.  I’ve told you that.  But we were acquainted when things were freer and people were less careful.  If my name or my picture is in any of his papers it may lead to my exposure and I don’t want to drag you down.” 

“Is that likely?” 

“I don’t know.” 

“If he’s got any sense, he’s at home now, feeding paper into his own fireplace.” 

“He hasn’t much sense, not really.  And I doubt he would keep quiet if I turned up to arrest him.” 

“So I’ll go.  We can keep you away from the case.” 

“Not without questions being asked.  Do you see how it is, Robbie?  I can’t take the risk.  I can’t risk you.” 

“But you expect me to abandon you at the slightest hint of trouble?” 

“I don’t expect that.  That’s why I’m not giving you a choice.” 

It is a crushing and unexpected injury. 

“Just until this blows over?” 

“I don’t know.” 

He presses his forehead to the arm of my chair and I rest my hand on his beautiful head. 

“Don’t do this, James, please.” 

He is up on his feet as footsteps pass on the landing outside. 

“I don’t have a choice.” 

Before we leave, he restores order to the room and, after ensuring everything he has thrown in has burnt away to ashes, extinguishes the fire.  

We both wear masks so cannot speak as we walk back to our cars.  We are accustomed to conducting our affection without words so it is fitting it should end with so few.  We came to an understanding in the spring by look.  By no more than an exchange of glances.  Then by a press of leg to leg, arm to arm and, at last, by James, ever fearless, taking my hand.  How did I know this quiet language when I had never spoken it before?  

There is nowhere to speak freely.  I have a sharp-eyed landlady, he curious neighbours.  Suspicion falls easily on those who habitually drink together and we have never risked dinner.  

I love him and I’ve told him; what more is there to say?  We have no future to plan.  We won’t see the bank manager about a mortgage or arrange a holiday together.  There are too many risks; career, reputation, freedom, his young life. 

We find our way back to the main road and must part at my car.  He pulls down his mask and briefly appears in the flicker of his lighter’s flame.  He nods a good night and disappears into the darkness.

 


	3. Sunday 7 December 1952

The smog has not cleared by Sunday morning. It has crept inside, into my landlady’s house; a diseased animal leaving a trail of grey slime on her clean kitchen surfaces.

We turn on the wireless and there is an odd obliviousness to the news broadcast. The announcer reports in humorous tones a performance cancelled at Sadlers Wells due to fog in the auditorium. He knows nothing of the sulphurous air, the silent city, the pervading darkness.

“That thing is a box of lies,” Dorothy, my landlady says. “You look dreadful, Mr Lewis, you oughtn’t to go out. If the Home Service won’t say it, I will; that air’ll kill us all.”

I do not take her advice as I hope to clear up the Morley case today.

I hope to see James today. 

I find the roads traffic-free. Sunday is always the quietest day of the week but I see few cars and no buses at all. I took the car back to the station before clocking off yesterday and now regret it. The more time I spend outside in search of public transport the worse I feel. But the underground is running a service of sorts and I take the tube to the West End.

This newly formed metropolis of whispering grey seems unpopulated even at its centre. I believe myself alone until a fellow pedestrian appears beside me or a car glides slowly by. I realise I have become accustomed to navigating by streetlight and the brightly lettered neon of Piccadilly Circus. Gordon’s Gin and Wrigley’s gum in constant wax and wane above.

Other creatures have adapted less well. I come across dead pigeons on the Savile Row pavement. At first, I think they have been overcome by the poison in the atmosphere but then I realise it is simply that they have crashed into buildings they can no longer see.

Uniform are almost at full complement but by ten o’clock, I am the only man of rank in. Which means I am the one to receive the briefings Scotland Yard sends. We are informed buses and coaches are not running, there is a minimal service on the railways and river traffic and airports remain at a standstill. We also learn the ambulance service, working at full capacity with all leave cancelled, is struggling to cope with the volume of calls and are likely to need help. I know the smog can make people ill, I’m feeling queasy myself. But in such numbers? 

I put all our constables on standby and Hathaway works with the sergeants to get them organised. Once we are as prepared as we can be, he appears in my office and closes the door. He stands, seemingly at a loss.

“Speak to me,” I tell him.

He must see the hope I can’t conceal in my expression, “I haven’t changed my mind,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry.”

“All right,” I reply. “What is it?”

He puts an envelope down on the desk in front of me, “I’m resigning.”

This place. Without him. “I don’t think so, sergeant.”

“I broke the law. I’ve compromised the case.”

“You and I broke the law nearly every day until yesterday. Had you forgotten?”

“This is different, this is the integrity of the investigation. And I’ve forced you to be complicit in what I did. The only honest policeman. I can’t regret it, but you shouldn’t have to cover for me.”

“What you did was courageous.”

“You wouldn’t have done it.”

“No, I wouldn’t.”

“But then, sir, how do you stand it, how do you live with yourself?”

“People round here play fast and loose with the rules of evidence all the time, and look where it’s got us. The place is a sewer. I live with myself by trying to catch criminals. Real criminals. How else? We’re here to uphold the law and that’s the end of it.”

“But when the laws you’re upholding are corrupt? St Augustine said, an unjust law is no law at all. You’ve got a duty to disobey.”

“You think this lot are followers of St Augustine? When they’re taking envelopes of cash from gangsters to turn a blind eye. You start bending the rules to suit yourself, how are you any better than the murderers and thieves? You’re a good man, Hathaway. And a good copper. Next time talk to me before you start lighting fires.” I tear his letter into pieces without opening it and drop it into the waste paper basket. “In the meantime, as much as I enjoy discussing moral philosophy with you, there’s work to be done.”

“But, sir -”

“Get on the phone to the magistrates court. We need a warrant to question Richard Marsten. I’m going to try and clear it with the commander.”

He stares at me. 

“Go on, we haven’t got all day.”

He deliberates over whether to muster an argument, but I see him concede defeat and go back to his office. I watch until he is settled behind his desk with a telephone receiver in his hand before turning to my own work.

We both lose hours to no purpose. No one sufficiently senior has come to work, not here, not at Scotland Yard and definitely not at the magistrates’ court. 

Perhaps we should knock on Richard Marsten’s well-appointed Belgravia front door. Treat him the same as any other murder suspect. He is not above the law as an MP. But the earache I’d likely get from everyone from the commissioner, to MI5, to Winston bloody Churchill deters me. We decide to give up until tomorrow. After all, if Marsten is at home, he is unlikely to be going anywhere. If he is on the run, he is long gone.

By lunchtime we are busy with emergencies. We have been receiving regular calls and visits from members of the public concerned about elderly or sick neighbours who haven’t been seen since Friday. But once we start getting our share of overflow ambulance calls it is one person after another with breathing problems, fainting and sickness all needing ferrying to hospital or, sometimes, to the mortuary. My landlady is starting to look like the only one with a real grip on the situation.

In the late afternoon Hathaway and I return to the Old Kent Road to collect Mrs Morley and drive her to the mortuary in Southwark where she is due to formally identify her son’s body. He has been prepared for viewing and we are taken straight to him. She confirms the identification with a few bitter tears.

When she has gathered herself, she takes an envelope from her handbag and gives it to me.

“I’ve been going through John’s things,” she tells us. “And I found this. I think he put it in with his old toys and books the last time he was over. I told him not hide stuff at my house, but he did it anyway.”

“What is it?”

She shrugs as if to say, ‘you’ll see’. 

She is visiting a friend nearby and Hathaway drives her there. I have an appointment to speak to the police surgeon and while I wait, I examine the envelope.

It is addressed to a Frank Pritchett at an address in north London and was posted in October 1947. Inside, I find a handwritten note from ‘Dickie’ to ‘Frankie’. It is no more than a jokey reference to ‘happy days’ and encloses a photograph. The picture was also taken in ‘47 according to the date on the back. It is of a small crowd of men during a boozy night out in a bar. Prominent in the front of the picture is Richard Marsten. He is embracing another young man in a pose which needs no explanation. In a sane society, the picture would be of no interest to anyone but its subjects. In these dark times it is worth a thousand pounds of anyone’s money.

The other people in the photograph are all young or middle aged, some are in uniform, some in suit and tie. I recognise none of them. But half out of shot, standing at the bar, a shaved blond head, a familiar profile, a haze of cigarette smoke. My beautiful boy never did like to have his picture taken.

I tuck the photograph into my inside pocket as the police surgeon finally appears.

“I haven’t had time to perform a post-mortem examination,” he tells me. “But I can confirm time of death as 9am, give or take half an hour. Your witness must have just missed the main event.”

“Cause of death?”

“He could have survived the bash on the head but the strangulation did for him.”

“That it?”

“Working on it, chief inspector,” he says gazing bleakly at his pipe. “I’m having a bit of a day, actually.”

But he has confirmed what we had guessed. John Morley died during his appointment with ‘RM’.

I find Hathaway waiting for me in the corridor outside. He is looking shaken and I ask him what’s wrong. He nods toward a half open door, “Look.” 

It is a large modern mortuary, walls lined with refrigerated chambers. Today, however, there are more bodies than the chambers can accommodate. I’d guess as many as fifty; on examination tables, on trollies, even on the floor. They are mostly elderly but there are the middle aged, the young, and even children. Many are still wearing the clothes they died in. 

“Why aren’t these bodies covered up?” I ask an attendant who is searching for a place to deposit John Morley.

“We’ve run out of shrouds, chief,” he says.

“Thousands must be dying,” Hathaway whispers. 

We had our share of deaths today but this is my first real understanding of the scale of the disaster. In the wars the sirens went off, there were explosions, destruction, blood and gore. Death was no surprise and there was no denying what was happening. But with smog, all you hear is coughing and all you see is nothing.

“What did Mrs Morley give you?” Hathaway asks as we walk back to the car. 

“Nothing.” I hand him the envelope. “Nothing we can use.”

He reads the note and is forming another question, presumably about where the rest of it is, when I am hit by a painful bout of coughing. It is the most severe so far and leaves me gasping for air. It is bad timing after what we have just seen.

“Do you need a doctor?” He asks when the attack subsides. 

“No.” 

He looks sceptical, “Are you sure? Are you breathing all right?”

“Yes, don’t fuss. Can we get inside.” 

My lodgings are nearby and he drives me home while I attempt to catch my breath.

“Do you think you’ll be well enough to come in tomorrow?” He asks when we are parked outside the house.

“I’m fine, Hathaway. And I’d quite like to question my suspect at some point. Before he’s appointed Home Secretary, if we can manage it.”

“I’ll come and collect you,” he says.

“I’ve said, I’m fine.”

“You have to let me, it’s in the Bagman manual; drive your inspector to work.”

“Suddenly he wants to do things by the book. All right. I’d appreciate it. But why don’t you stay here tonight?” 

He lives in north London and I don’t like the thought of the long drives chauffeuring me about would entail if the air does not clear by tomorrow.

I stop him as he starts to protest, “There’s no risk; there’s a vacant room.”

My landlady is happy to host a refugee from the smog but warns that no fresh food has reached our local shops since Thursday. Dinner is tinned ham, tinned veg and questionable leftovers. I don’t have much appetite, so eat a bowl of soup, tomato not pea, and go to bed early.

Later, I hear Hathaway making his way upstairs. Unexpectedly he knocks at my door.

“Dorothy made you a hot drink,” he says. “Honey, lemon and whiskey.”

“That’s kind of her.” 

“Mostly whiskey.”

“Aye, I’ve sampled her remedies before.”

He rests the cup and saucer on the bedside table, “Is there anything you need? Can I do anything for you?” 

“I don’t think so, James. I’m much better now.”

I watch him taking stock of the room. My shaving kit on the chest of drawers, a stack of unanswered letters, today’s tie on the wardrobe door. I have a few framed family photographs and a picture of Val on the mantelpiece but personal things, heavy with reminiscence, caused too much pain for too long and I let them go. He takes it all in and I wonder what he makes of it. It is poor show for a life as long as mine but, with my heart, it all belongs to him. His gaze slides across to me. 

“You’d better go on up,” I tell him quietly. 

“Yes, I know.” He sighs. “I know. Goodnight, Robbie.”

I hear him go into the spare room. Two floors up and one room across; I feel the distance between us more keenly than when we are on opposite banks of the river. He has made his position clear but that doesn’t stop me wishing for all these walls and doors and staircases to melt away so I can, just for once, lie down beside him.


	4. Monday 8 December 1952

 

I am no longer surprised at the greenish yellow void I see when I look out of the kitchen window on Monday morning.  On this fourth day, it is easy to believe the smog will never end; that the city will become myth or memory; forever trapped under its grubby shroud.  

“Sir?”  He has my coat and helps me into it.  “We should get going.” 

But we are too late to miss the Monday morning rush hour.  Londoners are determined to get to work.  They have taken out their cars to compensate for the lack of bus and coach services while, at the same time, London Transport runs more services and van drivers attempt their deliveries.  The result is predictably chaotic. 

Why has this been allowed to happen?  Why aren’t the announcers on the wireless telling people to stay at home unless travelling is unavoidable?  Why pretend this isn’t happening? 

Toward the end of our journey, we are caught in a Piccadilly Circus traffic jam while a minor accident ahead is cleared. 

“I think it’s moving,” Hathaway says after studying the view from his window.  “The fog’s moving.” 

“That’s more than we are.” 

“It’s a good sign.  Is it a good sign?” 

“It might suggest a breeze, I suppose.” 

“Or it’s come alive?  Sentient smog.  _The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes.”_

“What’s that?  More Dickens?” 

“Eliot.  _The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes.  Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening, linger upon the pools that stand in drains, let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys_.” 

“Can’t you memorise anything pleasant?”  I ask, although I would happily listen to him speak those words all day.  “Something with daffodils and lambs to cheer us up?” 

“Yes, sir.  Daffodils.”  He mimes writing a note.  “Lambs.” 

But it does seem more alive today.  I watch as the smoky air swirls and thins, shifts and turns, curling itself this way and that.  For a few, brief moments a looming dark monster above reveals itself as the diminutive statue of Eros.  The god of love rules yet, here in the heart of befouled London. 

I need to speak.  Not here.  The chatter of the police radio censors me, but I need to speak. 

I reach across and take his hand.  Shocked, he tries to free it but then, slowly, his expression softens into acceptance. 

“We’ll go to Giorgio’s,” I say and he nods. 

*** 

The birds in flight are starting to return.  I see their grey outline on our bomb-damaged living room wall, catch glimpses of their once-rich plumage. 

“I’m not abandoning you.  Whatever happens, whatever you say, I can’t.” 

“It’s not safe,” he says.  “Robbie, we’re not safe.” 

“Life isn’t safe.  Life is war and sickness and pointless death.  Breathing is dangerous, standing on the street is dangerous.  If anything happens, we’ll face it together.  There’s no other option for me.” 

“What did Mrs Morley give you, yesterday?  Really.” 

“Nothing. I told you.”  

He kisses me hard and if I never see the sun again, if I never take another breath of clean air, I won’t care because he is all I need. 

We are graced with the chief superintendent’s presence today and I bring him up to date with the Morley case.  I show him the diary along with the newspaper cutting and explain why our next step is to interview Richard Marsten.  

“Don’t you have any other evidence?”  He asks. 

“No, sir.” 

I had a photograph.  But that went into the fire before I turned in last night.  It burnt nicely along with the principles I had adhered to since I joined the police thirty years ago.  

“There was nothing else at the victim’s flat?” 

“Nothing, sir.” 

“He must have something on all these people in his diary.” 

“We assume he has a separate hiding place but we haven’t been able to locate it.” 

“It’s all a bit flimsy, isn’t it?” 

Which is rich coming from the chief super of Bent Copper Central.  He tells me to do nothing until he has spoken to the commander and the question must spend the rest of the day ascending the chain of command.  It is not until after four that he saunters into my office.  Hathaway happens to be there. 

“Richard Marsten is dead,” he says.  

Hathaway doesn’t move. 

“How did that happen?”  I ask. 

“Fog fever, they’re calling it.  Which means something bronchial, I imagine.  He was found in his flat this morning but time of death hasn’t been established.  The commander suggests, in view of this, you follow other lines of enquiry.” 

“Can we see the body?” Hathaway asks. 

“No need for that, given your instruction to look elsewhere.” 

Hathaway walks out of the room, collects his hat and coat and, without a word, leaves the building. 

The chief superintendent doesn’t seem surprised by this behaviour, “He’s very intense, isn’t he?  What’s this I hear about him unilaterally setting our detainees free?” 

“There was _fog fever_ in the cells, sir.” 

He gives me a sharp look, “I see.  By the way, good work on holding the fort over the weekend.  You and Sergeant Hathaway can take leave tomorrow.” 

We are dismissed and that is the end of it.  John Morley’s family will be denied justice and the crime will remain on our books unsolved.  I don’t believe the ‘fog fever’ story for a moment and I wonder what really happened.  Did Marsten come home on Friday with Morley’s blood on his hands and, in panic or remorse, kill himself?  From Hathaway’s description, he doesn’t seem the type.  But a sitting MP in these hysterical times.  More likely he got a visit from the security services this morning and they helped his bronchial problems along.  Or perhaps, given his connections, he has been spirited out of the country to warmer climes.  If that is the case, good for him.  The crime was his but society must take some responsibility.  Corrupt times can force your hand.  Or so I seem to have discovered. 

After the evening rush hour wears itself out, I take the tube to Camden Town.  I want to be sure Hathaway has gone home and not to Eaton Place to discover the truth of what happened, to once again take matters into his own hands. 

I find my way in the smoky but now navigable air, to the flat he sub-lets from his uncle; a room on the top floor of a tall shabby Georgian terrace. 

“Forgive me, Robbie,” he says bringing me in and locking the door behind me.  “I was too angry to stay.  I’m glad you’re here.” 

I should leave once I have seen for myself he is not out getting into trouble.  But instead, he pours me a brandy and I sit with him on his sofa where he retreated this afternoon to smoke and drink and mourn. 

He doesn’t believe Marsten is still alive.  He thinks the man was too noisy and indiscreet to be trusted with his liberty.  Neither could the scandal of a court case be countenanced. 

“All these wasted lives,” I say. “All for nothing.” 

He gets up to stoke the fire but the draughty room never quite warms up. 

“I know you’ve compromised yourself to protect me,” he says, when he is back next to me, fitting himself against me, wrapping himself around me. 

“Sometimes there are no right answers,” I find myself telling him.  “Sometimes you have to make the least bad choice.” 

“Now you sound like me.” 

“Aye, it does seem to be rubbing off.  But there’s been worse crimes than ours gone unpunished.  And at least you’re out of danger.” 

He shrugs, “For now.” 

“Meaning?” 

“MI5 would have searched Marsten’s flat and taken anything of interest.”  

“I can’t see them wanting to show their hand by prosecuting you or anyone else.” 

“No, but they’d keep a file.  And I’m wondering why my career mysteriously doesn’t progress five or ten years down the line -.”  He abruptly dismisses the thought.  “As long you’re safe, I don’t much care.” 

When the fire burns out and the bottle is half empty, he says from his place against my shoulder, “You can’t go home.”


	5. Tuesday 9 December 1952

 

I wake in a room filled with the cool pearlescence of winter sunlight.  Wind gusts outside, strong enough to shake the windows in their frames.  James’ narrow bed scarcely accommodates his own rangy self, let alone me.  But we fit well enough together and I find him still asleep with his back pressed up against me, his heart beating under my hand. 

It is almost too much, to have what I have long wanted, a slowly waking body in my arms after a night of quiet breaths and whispered words.  We make love again.  Gently, as if this is how all our mornings begin. 

“The house next door is for sale,” he tells me afterwards.  “There’s bomb damage so it’s cheap.” 

“You’re thinking of buying it?” 

“I thought,” he says, pushing himself up to look at me.  “Maybe we could buy it together.  Invent a story; say I’m your lodger or something.  Can you imagine it?” 

I can imagine.  No more bombsites, no more listening for footsteps on the stairs, no more clandestine activity behind enemy lines.  Just the simple domesticity I miss from my marriage. 

He gets up first, putting on a dressing gown, lighting the fire and pushing shillings into the meter. 

“It’s gone,” he says from the window. 

When he is downstairs in the bathroom, I get up and quickly dress in the chill.  I put a kettle to boil for tea and, while I wait, I push back the curtain. 

During the night, a west wind has passed through the city, chasing the smog away, leaving a cloudless sky.  There is not a wisp of fog or smoke left.  Even the air inside smells cleaner. 

In front of the house, a tree bends in the breeze, its bare branches laced with a delicate frost.  I can see each knot and wrinkle in the bark, each twig and ice crystal.  As if today, nature is determined to display its configurations in every tiny detail. 

I feel exposed in all this clarity; as though James and I have lost the protection invisibility affords.  I stand back when people pass by on the pavement below.  What if one of them should glance up and find me in a place I should not be. 

He returns from the bathroom, washed and shaved, a towel around his neck. 

“Don’t look at the water when you wash your hair next,” he says.  “It’s horrific.”  

I draw the curtain closed and he gives me a curious look, “We’re too high up to be seen,” he says. 

The kettle whistles and he spoons tea into a stout brown teapot.  While it brews, he towels his hair dry and combs it rigorously.  He doesn’t mind me watching this morning ritual and I learn that his hair, short as it is, spikes when wet. I wonder what other secrets his body keeps from me and if I am ever to learn them. 

The application of a vanishingly unnecessary quantity of Brylcreem completes the process and explains some of the scent I associate with him.  I file this new piece of information away with the rest. 

He takes bread from a cupboard, “It’s from Thursday.  It’ll be all right for toast.” 

“Sounds delicious.” 

“By the way,” he says.  “If anyone asks, you’re my inspector and you couldn’t get home in the soup so I put you up for the night.” 

“Someone asked?” 

“The lady who answered when you rang the doorbell thought you were my uncle.  I didn’t want to say you were because he might turn up one day.” 

“Christ.” 

“It’s nothing to worry about.  Honestly.” 

“Shall we go out?”  He asks while we eat breakfast. “Now the smog’s gone and since we’ve been given the day off.  I know where.” 

I take his hand across the table and kiss its palm.  Who knows when I’ll get another chance. 

“Why not,” I say. 

It is the first time I have seen him dressed in anything other than a suit and he is distractingly handsome in a thick, black cable knit and a leather jacket he brought back from France. He finds me a jumper, scarf and warm tweed jacket among his uncle’s things and deems us ready to venture out.   

We borrow a motorbike from a housemate; a rattling wartime Triumph and take off in the opposite direction to the rush hour traffic.  In half an hour we are on Hampstead Heath.  

It is busy on the heath for a weekday and there is a happy atmosphere of liberation; a city of survivors emerging laughing into the daylight.  I see why he has come here.  After the muddy air of the last few days, the cold, fresh breeze at the top of the city feels purifying.  We go up to Parliament Hill where the view takes in the whole vista of London.  St Paul’s and the Tower, Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament, as vivid and perfect as souvenir replicas out of the box. 

“I’ve got an apt poem,” Hathaway informs me when an elderly couple standing nearby move away to continue their walk. 

“I don’t doubt it.” 

 _“_ It’s Wordsworth but not the daffodil one.” 

“I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt.” 

_“This City now doth, like a garment, wear The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.”  
_

“Marvellous.  And reasonably cheerful too.  Well done, sergeant.” 

“Sir,” he says, saluting smartly. 

“Can I hear the rest of it?” 

“Of course.  All my poetry is for you.  All my everything.” 

He says it so casually it takes a moment to realise what he has declared. 

“Same here, James, same here.” 

He recites as we walk.  His voice, like his touch, should only be allowed in private.    

I tire sooner than I would like.  The cleansing air is yet to polish the smog from these old lungs.  It does not escape his notice. 

“Shall we go and get a proper breakfast?”  He asks. 

We leave behind the bright and glittering city and head back to the road.  When we are momentarily free of dog walkers and darting children, we talk about the house he wants to buy. 

“You don’t think we should, do you?”  He says. 

“All it would take is one slip up.  One mistake.  A curtain left open, the wrong person looking in and we’ve got some thug of a constable knocking at our door.”  

“It was just a daydream,” he says. “We don’t have to live together to be together.” 

“I’m sorry. Truly.” 

“It’s just the way things are.” 

The air here is as sweet as one of his kisses and the cold is a caress. For one daring moment, our hands clasp together and then, respectably apart, we walk on.  

 

End 

 

May 2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> James quotes from Bleak House, by Charles Dickens, The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock by TS Eliot and Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802, By William Wordsworth.
> 
> Family Britain 1951-1957, David Kynaston  
> The much-publicised flight to Russia … of the two spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean, both homosexual, had badly rattled the establishment, and the Tory Home Secretary, Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe, was now making the active prosecution of homosexuals almost his highest priority, allied to the introduction of ‘positive vetting’ in the Civil Service in order to unroot ‘serious character weaknesses’. Police activity hit a new, startling intensity, reflected in the comparative England and Wales figures for 1938 and 1952: cases of sodomy and bestiality up from 134 to 670; attempts to commit ‘unnatural offences’ including indecent assaults, up from 822 to 3087; offences of gross indecency between males up from 320 to 1686. Behind these and similar figures lay many, many human tragedies. Alan Turing, tried at the Quarter Sessions in Knutsford, Cheshire was humiliatingly sentenced to a course of organo-therapy treatment at Manchester Royal Infirmary, rendering him impotent and making him grow breasts; the camp, highly popular Lancashire comedian George Williams was charged with a homosexual offence and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment, effectively ending his career as a top-of-the-bill performer; and the much-decorated war hero Michael Calvert was court-martialled for ‘gross indecency’ with male persons’ and dismissed from the army.
> 
> Queer City, Peter Ackroyd  
> Eight policemen, in groups of two, monitored the public lavatories in a well-worn circuit from Victoria Station to Bloomsbury Way. The level of arrests increased exponentially as did the incidence of blackmail. Some men were given immunity from persecution if they testified against others. All of them were, according to one prosecuting barrister ‘perverts, men of the lowest character’. Other expressions of disgust were common. It would not be too much to say that an incipient police state was beginning to emerge.
> 
> The Wolfenden Committee report published in 1957 recommended that ‘homosexual behaviour between consenting adults in private should no longer be a criminal offence’. This was not made law until 1967.
> 
> Met Office website  
> During the period of the fog, huge amounts of impurities were released into the atmosphere. On each day during the foggy period, the following pollutants were emitted: 1,000 tonnes of smoke particles, 2,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, 140 tonnes of hydrochloric acid and 14 tonnes of fluorine compounds. In addition, and perhaps most dangerously, 370 tonnes of sulphur dioxide were converted into 800 tonnes of sulphuric acid.
> 
> Ministry of Health, Report no. 95., January 1954  
> It must in truth be a supreme example of the way in which a Metropolis of eight and quarter million people can experience a disaster of this size without being conscious all the while of its occurrence. 
> 
> Killer Smog, William Wise  
> …All over the city motorists had completely lost their bearings. One police patrol car still managing to operate south of the river, came upon a line of vehicles apparently stalled. Leaving his own driver, the sergeant groped his way forward to the first car. The lady inside was trying to reach her home in Croydon and hadn’t the faintest idea where she was. The sergeant led them for two miles until he started choking.
> 
> …The (ambulance)driver, it turned out, had not arrived at the hospital for a very sound reason. More than an hour and a half after leaving his station, and while still on route, he had been informed by his attendant that the last of their patients in the ambulance had just died. The driver was a man of initiative. He had simply swung past the hospital entrance and delivered his four dead passengers to the nearby mortuary.
> 
> …It wasn’t their numbers though that startled him. It was the way they were lying there on various benches and tables, their exposed faces turned upward to the ceiling, and none of them, as far as he could see, wrapped up for burial yet. An attendant explained the situation. The matter was really quite simple. There was nothing left to wrap the corpses in. So many people had died that Southwark had used up its supply of shrouds.
> 
> …In early January 1953, an article appeared in the British Medical Journal, suggesting that as many as 4700 deaths had been caused by the smog. (More recent research suggests that the total number of fatalities was considerably greater; about 6,000 more died in the following months as a result of the event.)
> 
> …It would hardly seem an exaggeration to suppose that between 50000 and 100000 people had been made sick to some degree after breathing the city’s polluted air for four consecutive days and nights.
> 
> …The Clean Air Act became law on 5 July 1956


End file.
